TREMONT — The idea to produce bottles of fruit-based alcoholic drinks along with their craft whiskeys and bourbons at the new J.K. Williams Distilling preceded the actual physical knowledge of the work required to process lemons, apples and peaches.

“We learned that it was absolute, complete torture,” said Kristin Williams, one of the four managing members and owners of J.K. Williams Distilling in East Peoria. The other three are her husband Jon Williams, his brother Jesse Williams and his wife Kassi Williams. “And it took the four of us way too long to do the messy job that it just wasn’t efficient use of our time trying to get the business started.”

So, they found a subcontractor.

The 80-proof product that is distilled in East Peoria and ends up in bottles that are handsomely labeled “Smitty’s Apple Pie” and “J.K.’s Lemon” begins its shelf-life in a humble outbuilding off of Illinois Route 9 on the windswept outskirts of Tremont. It’s in an area that also houses the Tazewell County Highway, Animal Control and Environmental Health departments and an enormous pile of road salt.

The fruit-processing wing of J.K. Williams Distilling has been happily given over to the clients of the Tazewell County Resource Center, also known as TCRC.

“It’s a great partnership,” said Jamie Durdel, the president and CEO of TCRC an agency that serves developmentally disabled adults in Tazewell County. “We’re really excited about it.”

J.K. Williams Distilling opened for business last October at 526 High Point Lane in East Peoria. They offer tours on weekends. While the fruit products, and corn whiskey, are available for sale now at the distillery and at area liquor and grocery stores, its first batch of bourbon will be sufficiently aged and ready for sale in June.

The business relationship between the distillers and the resource center evolved from a personal relationship between Durdel and Jon Williams. TCRC receives money from the United Way; Williams served on the United Way’s allocation committee.

“Jon and I had lunch to catch up. He told me about his new whiskey-distilling business and that turned into talk about the fruit-based products they were making,” Durdel said. “I told him I just happened to know of a workforce that would be a perfect fit with his business. It turned out to be a great thing.”

The work is a good fit for the skills of some of the center’s clients. About six workers have been trained to clean and hand-peel the fruit, operate the commercial juicer and strain the juice into pure product.

Page 2 of 2 - “It’s a job that requires the same steps performed over and over again,” said Kelly Meals, the director of the new food services division at the center. “A client with Down syndrome or dementia can easily learn the repetitive nature of the task and every time they do it the better they get at it. The better they get at it, the more money they make.”

The center is close to receiving its commercial food license from the state. That will allow the center to enter into third-party agreements and sell food products to one party that then sells it to another, like selling to a school district food that will in turn be sold to students.

“That will make a big difference in the kind of jobs we can then go after,” Meals said.

Along with the contract with J.K. Williams, the first contract the center has entered into, the center does catering jobs, makes dog biscuits and has a deal to make 1,500 pumpkin pies for this year’s Morton Pumpkin Fest.

The work so far for J.K. Williams Distilling has been sporadic; four gallons of lemon juice here, 11 gallons of apple juice there. A typical job would be to process lemons for “J.K.’s Lemon.” The center would receive the delivery of two to three cases of lemons, or about 250 to 300 lemons, that would produce roughly four gallons of lemon juice.

“We have one worker who loves to clean the lemons,” Meals said. “Over and over again. She produces the cleanest lemons you will ever see.”

For Kristin Williams, the best part of the partnership with TCRC is its opportunity to make a difference in the community.

“They meet our quality standards and it aligns with the values of our business — a hard day’s work to provide for our families. That’s what we are all about,” Williams said. “Adults with disabilities — everybody — deserves that chance at a hard day’s work to provide for our families. They receive the benefits of the work, the pride of the paycheck, the self-satisfaction, and we receive the benefits of their work. Perfectly prepared product done just the way we want it. You couldn’t ask for a better fit.”

Scott Hilyard can be reached at 686-3244 or by email at shilyard@pjstar.com. Follow @scotthilyard on Twitter.